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It’s my birthday in a week (9th October!) and for once I’ve actually remembered to do a birthday related post! I decided to start out simple and give you guys a glimpse of what is on my birthday wish list. Being an October baby I pretty much spend most of the year planning for my birthday and Christmas, and then rinse and repeat again the next year. Our anniversary is also in October so I can’t even use that as an excuse for some goodies either! It does mean that by the time October rolls around I have a solid idea of what I want and any impulse buys have long lost their luster.

1. Blog Domain Name

It is finally time to move this blog to it’s own domain! It’s a big step with lots of SEO bits and bobs (and probably a massive headache), but it needs to be done and to be honest, I want it done! I wouldn’t say I’ve been putting it off, but rather it just didn’t feel like the right time before. Now the blog feels much more grounded and it’s grown into what I wanted it to be. It’s time 🙂

2. Iphone Camera Lens Kit

Ideally a new camera would be great, however, the next step for me would be a dslr camera which I don’t actually know how to use properly! Chris has one and he’s happy to let me use it and, more importantly, teach me how to use it. So there is little point in me investing in a camera right now. I do have my own camera but it’s so outdated that my iphone actually gives me far better quality photos so I’ve been investing in equipment for that. My first was this fantastic tripod which has been so valuable. I can use it as a “selfie” stick or I can use it as a tripod – and it’s got bendy legs so I can put it at weird angles for photos or wrap it around anything. This lens kit would give me everything I really want from a dslr camera without having to pay for one and without needing to learn all the technical settings, which I have to admit my ME brain fogged mind is struggling with. There are more expensive options but I’d prefer to try a cheaper option and see how it works and then upgrade at a later date.

3. L’Oreal Smooth Sugar Scrub

As I reported in my last Sample Shoutout I received a sample of this and absolutely fell in love it. It has been the only product I’ve ever found to help me with one of my beauty problems so getting hold of a full sized tub of the Nourish Cocoa Face And Lip Scrub has been a priority since I tried it!

4. Calligraphy Pens

Last Christmas I got a huge haul of bullet journal goodies from The Works and they were all great! I got a small calligraphy pen set and while I haven’t really been using it for calligraphy per say I have swapped to writing with them. The problem is that I want to use all the inks and all the colours and I have just one pen. The set had three nibs and just one pen. So this time I’m upping my game and eyeing up this Sheaffer Calligraphy set which comes with three pens not just the nibs. This means I can have multiple inks on the go without having to swap nibs or worry about them drying out. I still have plenty of ink cartridges left, however, the pack was not well balanced in colours so I’m also going to get a pack of cartridges by the Manuscript Pen Company Creative. They’ve had great reviews and have some nifty colours that my other pack didn’t have!

5. Nail Polishes

My nail polish collection is dying. The only new additions it has had in years have been courtesy of my mother in law who has either bought be colours that aren’t my cup of tea or the same colour of turquoise in about 5 different shades (I’m not joking). The problem is that I don’t really have the money to go on a full on nail polish shopping spree – especially not if I get everything else on this list. So I’ve had to think about it and I’ve come up with a few solutions; nail polish subscription boxes such as the two pictured above (Mani and Lola and MeeBox), a decent nail polish advent calendar this year (I’ve yet to decide on which one), buy an advent calendar from a previous year for a discounted price (such as this Technic Advent Calendar) and buy some gift sets or bulk sets of nail polish (such as this Rimmel London nail polish set). There’s also Primark and a few of the pound shops/discount shops that have started doing their own Beauty lines which are getting some great reviews so I’m going to check those out too. Hopefully by the end of that I should have a good start to a collection again!

6. Washi Tape

Yep, I am a Washi Tape addict and my small meagre collection just doesn’t cut it any more. The time has come to invest in some more beautiful sets such as this gorgeous Starry Sky Washi tape set from 812 Journal. I much prefer to get sets like this at this stage so that I can build up a decent collection and then I can add individual tapes later on.

7. Mantaray Purse

I’m not really a big purse fan, or someone who buys them a lot – bags on the other hand I am really bad with especially when I’m on holiday. I don’t tend to find bags in my style until I go abroad to Europe or visit markets over here and then I want to buy them ALL. But purses I have a hard time finding one I like and so when I finally found a brand I liked I stuck with it. I think this will be my third Mantaray purse now and I literally wear them to death; my current one is falling to pieces. What I love about them is that they’re actually embroidered so you get that real texture feel rather than a plastically feel like some purses/wallets, and it’s just the right size for what I want. And Mantaray as a brand fits with my boho nature loving style too, and I just fell in love with the colours and design of this embroidered Hummingbird purse by them. I usually get my watches by them as well, and while I really need a new watch too my purse is literally falling apart and thus makes this list!

8. Wet Brush Hair Brushes

I’ve slowly been upgrading my beauty supplies, moving from cheaper versions to more professional and higher quality alternatives. So far I’ve upgraded my tweezers and my nail files and now it’s time for my hair brushes. I’ve been eyeing up the brand Wet Brushes for a while, and although I like their standard brush I think I’m actually going to go with these two instead. One is their Flex Dry Hair Brush which is designed to help you dry your hair as you brush it. I use two hair brushes; my usual hair brush and then an older one for when I’ve had a shower. My hair is so thick that if I use my normal hair brush to brush through my hair when it’s wet I just soak my brush. This wonderful invention though helps your hair dry as you use it and as I air dry my hair that makes it super useful for me! I’m also going to get their Shine Hair Brush as my normal brush as it has boar bristles and is a bit bigger than their standard brush – great for someone with long thick hair like mine!

9. DVDs or NowTV Subscription

We are so behind on films, that there’s a lot of movie DVDs on my wish list – but as I’m also so behind on TV shows I’m weighing up buying the movies on DVD against buying a NowTV subscription for a month. It might be cheaper and easier to do that so I can see all the movies and also get caught up on TV shows at the same time. We’re about fourmovies behind in the Marvel Cinematic universe, I’ve still not seen Solo and there’s loads of other movies like Oceans 8 too. While I’d love to be able to splash out and get them all on DVD it’s just realistically possible and as you can see this is down at #9 on my list so it’s not that high on my priorities either.

10. Beauty Products

Thanks to my big beauty prize win most of my beauty needs are covered for a very long time, however, there’s a few things that are mainly every day restocks that I need. I was sent my first face oil as a product tester and it did wonders for my skin, and sadly, I finished it 🙁 So looking for a new replacement I’m going to try one from Revolution’s new skincare range. Namely their Skin Plumping & Hydrating Solution with 2% Hyaluronic Acid which is very close (if not the same) as the product I was testing just without the brand name and thus the massive price tag. Another product replacement for the same tester panel is B. Brightening Fruit Acid Cleanser. I’m not sure if this is exactly what I’m looking for, however, it’s the closest match I could find so I’m going to give it ago first. I absolutely love Cucumber Cooling Eye Pads for when my eyes are sore and tired and need to stock up on some new ones.

And then the other two products on my list are two new items that are treats for myself that I have been eyeing up for a while now! One is L’Oréal’s Infallible Total Cover Concealer Palette. I was going to go the full hog and get their foundation too, however, I’ve found that BB cream works so much better for me and I’ve also fallen in love with Garnier’s Skin Active BB Cream so there is no point in me getting another foundation I won’t use. I’ve heard great things about the coverage of this range and I want to try it out because my other colour correct palette is beginning to run out.

The other product is ALINICE Hair colouring material which is a form of styling wax but coloured! I’m not quite ready to go the full bleach and dye route yet but I want to play around with some streaks and have some fun so I’m going to get a pot of this in purple. There’s some really mixed reviews and to be honest, I’m not too fussed if the product isn’t great as it’s only £9.99. I just want to see how I look with purple hair and decide if it’s something I want to do one day.

Everything Else

Naturally that’s not everything, not even close 😉

So just in case your curious about what didn’t make the top 10 cut you can view my full wish list here!